Iraq: Wave of violence kills 41, wounds 151 in Iraq

1st Oct 2013

BAGHDAD, (Xinhua): Up to 41 people were killed and 151 wounded in a new wave of bombings in Iraq mainly targeting busy areas across the country’s capital of Baghdad on Monday, apparently in an attempt by militant groups to stir up all-out sectarian strife in the country.

The worst violence occurred in Baghdad in the morning, when 13 car bombs ripped through eight Shiite-majority districts and two Sunni-majority, an Interior Ministry source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

In one area, three car bombs detonated in three places at Shaab district in the northeastern part of Baghdad, killing five people and wounding 30 others, the source said.

Meanwhile, nine people were killed and 25 wounded when two more car bombs went off in Baghdad’s northern district of Kadhmiyah, the source added.

Another car bomb struck a wholesale market at the Shiite bastion of Sadr City district in eastern Baghdad, killing six people and wounding 10 others, he said.

A car bomb was detonated in the southeastern New Baghdad district, killing four people and wounding 10 others, while another car bomb exploded in the northern suburb of Sabie al-Bour, killing three people and wounding 13, the source added.

One more car bomb struck the eastern al-Baladiyat district and killed a civilian and wounded nine, he said, adding that a 10th car bomb hit the Shiite district of Shulla in the northwestern part of Baghdad, killing four people and wounding 14.

Furthermore, two car bombs went off at the predominantly Sunni districts of Ghazaliyah and Jamia in western the capital, killing four people and wounding 22 others, the source added.

Another booby-trapped car hit Baiyaa district in southern the capital and killed a civilian and wounded five more, he said.

In west of Baghdad, a roadside bomb went off near a police commando patrol in eastern Fallujah city, some 50 km west of the capital, killing a police commando and wounding three others, including an officer, a local police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

Separately, a soldier was killed and three wounded in a roadside bomb explosion near their patrol in the southern part of the city Baiji, some 200 km north of Baghdad, a local police source anonymously told Xinhua.

In Iraq’s eastern province of Diyala, a sticky bomb attached to the car of an official in the provincial education department detonated in the provincial capital city of Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad, killing him and wounding his sons and a bodyguard, a provincial police source told Xinhua.

Also in the province, a policeman was killed and five wounded when a roadside bomb struck their bus near a village located some 10 km north of Baquba, the source said.

The attacks came a day after a wave of insurgent attacks that killed 55 people and wounded some 135 others across Iraq, including the relatively calm autonomous region of Kurdistan in northern the country.

Iraq is witnessing its worst eruption of violence in recent years, which raises fears that the country is sliding back to the full-blown civil conflict that peaked in 2006 and 2007, when monthly death toll sometimes exceeded 3,000.

The UN Assistance Mission for Iraq said earlier this month that almost 5,000 civilians were killed and 12,000 others injured in Iraq from January to August this year.

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